Getting used to moving around.

     For 3 days in a row, I walked to the 201/202 bus stop from my place, which is about 1.2 miles roundtrip. You may be thinking, "so what?" However, for me, it is quite an achievement. For the past 2 years I have been lying down about 22~23 hours a day in pain; just breathing itself was unbearable.

I have come far within last 6 months. Taking a long break in S. Korea was the best choice I made in last 2.5 years, haha. I'm trying to sit and walk around as much as I can, and reduce the time I'm lying down. I have become really good at lying down; it's all I did for a while. Now, I sit at least for an hour and review chem for the chem 7L, because it has been 2 years since I did any gen. chem work. School is starting in 9 days and I'm trying to get used to being active. It is hard, but I have to do it.

This is the point in my life in which I either wither away or thrive. If I cannot handle 5 classes (3 of them being labs, 4~6 hours/day, oh fck me...) and graduate this summer, I really wouldn't be able to survive in thie capitalistic society. The only skill (if you could call it that) is that I can speak English... that's it. A 23 year old male/man who can speak english with no college degree; that isn't very useful.

Anyways, I have lost 2.5 years due to sever pain. I have to be as effecient as possible from now on, no matter how much it hurts to breathe. I will most likely live with this condition, but what can I do other than to accept it? Be strong Jin, be strong. Keep going no matter what.

2013 is ending soon...

It has been over 3 years since my last blog. In that period of time, I have gotten my green card so I'm no longer undocumented (good thing!). However, I got a severe injury on 6/19/2011 which progressed into a debilitating chronic pain (affected my breathing) that ruined my life...

I miss being able to surf; actually I just miss being able to handle life. I cannot do much due to pain. Just sitting is excruciatingly painful; anything other than lying down is pain for me. I stopped seeing friends since I was so miserable in pain; I now have handful of people I contact sometimes; once a month? jesus, I am alone. I cannot commute to school since it is so painful to just move around. I spend most of my time lying down, reading kindle since sitting is also painful after several minutes. But I grit my teeth and try to lengthen the total time I can spend walking around and sitting to get stuff done. I am very afraid of what I will be able to do from now on. I am 23 year old; I'm not sure if I can even complete 3 lab classes needed to graduate since they are 5 hours long. Can I even hold down a job? How will I function in a society?

I look completely normal on the outside; people have hard time believing me when I tell them that I have severe chronic pain and lie down. They think that I'm crazy... which is partially true since the pain does drive me crazy.

I have recently moved to a new address to prep for school... I haven't told the new housemates/landlord about my physical condition since it will affect the way they treat me/look at me. Since it is a very quiet and private place, and we rarely hang out, I have decided to not tell them and keep our relationship as normal as possible. Without them judging me or thinking ahead to not bother me because of the pain. I had sam gyup sal with two guys; it was a good time but also a torture as I had trouble eating too much due to pain. It was a labor to keep chewing the meat; I was caring about the mechanism of chewing and swalloing instead of tasting the meat, since the pain made me focus on it. God, I'm blabbering too much.

Even though I took 5.5 month break in S. Korea, I haven't healed as much as I wanted. Before I went back, I was really suffering; because the pain was so bad that it scared me to not move as much as possible, my overall physical condition deteriorated.

I now know that this pain could most likely be permanent, so I might as well as move as much as possible to keep myself in shape. As idiotic/weird as it sounds like, there is a distinction between my chronic pain for breathing vs overall physical condition. I need to move around, sit, and live life despite the fact that it will hurt way more than if I just lied down to minimize breathing movements. It is really hard to explain it right now, so I will need to collect myself and explain it.